Adamek wrapping up training camp

By Przemek Garczarczyk
Photos: Mike Gladysz/Team Adamek

Former light heavy and cruiserweight world champion-turned heavyweight contender Tomasz Adamek (45-2, 28 KOs) is finishing training camp before his June 16 showdown with Eddie Chambers (38-2, 18 KOs) at the Prudential Center in Newark, New Jersey. The bout is one of the most highly anticipated heavyweight bouts in America this year and will be televised live on NBC Sports Network’s Fight Night series.

Special plans for the last part of the training camp?

Just the usual: last week of sparring sessions, but the toughest ones, ten- and twelve-rounders are behind us now. Altogether, we had almost 100 sparring rounds done – that’s about what we wanted to do before training camp started almost ten weeks ago. Now is a time to get the energy back, getting enough to keep Eddie busy for – if necessary – twelve rounds of high tempo boxing. I will not tell you about how many people were on the canvas during the whole training camp – this is behind the curtains stuff and we have respect for everybody we welcomed to work with me. I’m ready to go now, weighing around 225 and expecting to weight the same in the Prudential Center.

Working in the gym, working in the ring with sparing partners – did you set up every workout to the specific weaknesses of Chambers, something you want to exploit?

Nothing like this, no reason to treat Eddie differently. Maybe a month ago, we – mostly my trainer Roger Bloodworth – were watching Chambers’ tapes and it was enough. During some of my recent interviews, reporters were asking about a “special” preparation for “special” Eddie Chambers. Why is he supposed to be a special fighter for me? I fought – and won – against faster and stronger opponents before. Of course, this is an important fight for me. We’re doing all what we can to be 100 percent on June 16, but just look at the people I fought in my career and tell me with a straight face that Chambers is special.

Recently I asked two of your colleagues, Polish fighters training in the States – Andrzej Fonfara (21-2, 12 KO) and Grzegorz Soszyński (21-1, 10 KO) – what will be a decisive factor in the ring, what will decide the fight between you and Eddie? Both of them said the same thing: more than skills, mental and physical stamina. What will you add to this list?

Making this fight your own style of fight. Whoever will get an upper hand doing it, will not only have some advantage – this fighter will dominate the fight. I always said that I never start the fight looking to KO anybody, because you cannot do this in the ring but in this particular fight, I’m convinced that whoever will start to be desperate, changing the game plan, forgets having a cool head in the ring, will go down. In this sport, when fighters as accomplished as me and Eddie are fighting, there are no special surprises – everybody knows everything about the other guy. But the other side of coin is “knowing” something in theory and actually doing it in the ring. I dedicate this saying to everybody who believes Chambers’ stories about “knowing” how to beat me.

I know that you don’t like to make predictions about you own fight, so let me ask you for different predictions. On June 30, Roy Jones Jr will fight 39-1, #5 WBC ranked light heavyweight Dawid Kostecki, your countryman and friend…

Of course I will be cheering for Dawid, he’s Polish like me. We know each other, but it will be a great fight. From what I heard, Roy is working hard and we all know what he can do. Kostecki has to be aware for every second of every round because Roy Jones Jr can do the things in the ring others only can read about it.